This interview is a long time in coming. The interview was done on a Sunday afternoon in November 2024 before the screening of FALLING SKY at Doc NYC. The film was inspired by the book by activist Davi Kopenawa the film is a look at the Yanomami community in the Amazon as they prepare to celebrate the life of Davi’s father-in-law who had just passed away. The film blew me away with it’s you are there depiction of life in this small community.(my review is here.)The interview was done in the waiting area of the Village East Cinema in New York City. It was a 40 plus minute talk with the film’s co director Eryk Rocha and it’s subject Davi Kopenawa and it was translated by Juliana Sakae who was the film’s publicist. It was a very animated discussion of the film and the genesis from Davi’s book becoming, over the course of some seven years, a feature documentary. It was one of the most satisfying interviews I was ever a part of. It was so intense that I intentionally held off doing the transcription of the interview for the recent release (The film opened in NYC at the beginning of the month and it opens this week in LA.)
What follows is a good portion of that talk. It is not the complete talk for two reasons, one technical and one not. The technical issue was due to the fact that about half way into the talk the theater waiting area which had been empty and devoid of people when we started, filled with people going to and from screenings. What was just our four voices became multiplied and some of the talk got lost in a wave of cross talk. I, nor the personwho did the original transcription, could bleed out all the voices and as a result we lost some of what was said. The non-technical issue was due to my having to edit out some material for one of two reasons, either the discussion was super specific to the film and would have made no sense to anyone who hasn’t seen the film, and the other reason was that it was essentially off topic.
I want to thank Eryk and Davi for taking the time to talk to me, and Juliana for doing the translating and putting this together.
STEVE:How did you guys end up coming together to make the movie?
ERYK: We went for Davi and Bruce to say that we wanted to make the movie. They liked the idea, and from there we started to develop the script, the research, this dialogue with Davi, with the Hutukara Association, which is the producer of the movie. We started to talk, and that was the starting point.
We never had the intention of making an adaptation of the book, because it's an unadaptable book. The film is much more like an inspiration of the book, or a dialogue with some aspects of the book. It was the starting point. It took us seven years from the beginning of reading the book to the movie on the screen, when the movie premiered in May 2024.
STEVE:That was going to be one of my questions… Why did it take seven years?
ERYK: Because during those years that we talked a lot with Davi, and researched and wrote some versions of the script. During this time there was the imponderables, like the death of Davi's father-in-law. That was when Davi and his community, the Watoriki, organized the festival in honor of his father-in-law. Davi and the leaders of the Watoriki invited us to go to their house, and for us to make this film of this incredible festival. A festival that celebrates the life, the rituals of the Yanomami. It's the festival that structures the whole film.
The ritual is called Reahu. We structured the entire film around it. Reahu is a ritual that honors great leaderships when they pass, but also it's a celebration of life at the same time.
So, during the party, we were simultaneously together with Davi, every day, talking to him, raising questions, and in this conversation stories would come up that, along with the party, permeate the film.
STEVE: I don't know how big a camera crew there was, but how was it, dealing with all these people coming into your village? I know it's a celebration of your father-in-law's life, but at the same time, having people there, trying to film a movie around that, I thin would be a bit hard.
DAVI: Well... We met among ourselves. I met the leaders first. They asked, what are they doing here? What are they going to do?
They're going to take pictures, and film. What are they bringing? So I went to explain to them. Our leadership authorized it. It's not like in the past, now we're being recognized.
They could come and film and they could also participate in the big party we were preparing. A big party to celebrate the birth of my father-in-law, who passed away.
Everything was open for them. It was very important for us to show our dance, singing, joy, and the community, thanking the wealth of our forest, thanking the wealth of our land, as it was created.
STEVE: I’ve watched hundreds of documentaries, but this film touch me a lot because it feels like it really represents the people. There's no barrier, usually there is an invisible barrier between filmmakers and indigenous people.
DAVI: That's good. Thank you. That's good because this film is really very demonstrative.
The Yanomami people are sacred, they never, they never thought that a person who takes a photo, a film, would think to show our images to people in cities. That's why we wanted to show our image to the people
It's not the people of the city, it's the people of the forest that have lived for many years, many, that have never been filmed to show. So it's the first time that we wanted to show to the people, to so we’d be recognized and respected.
ERYK : Can I add something to what Davi said? Davi and the Yanomami who watched the film, felt represented. I think this is due to a relationship of trust built over time.
We talked a lot before, exchanged many ideas, brought Hutukara Yanomani Association to the project, also involved a group of filmmakers, communicators and Yanomami in the film team, people making cameras, sound, production. Davi, Gabriela and I exchanged many ideas with Davi in the sense of communication, to really create a trust, a respect. The film is the result of seven years of work.
I think that time is the co-author of all films. So I think that what he felt materializes a little this process too.
STEVE: Time is the co-author of the film?
ERYK: Yes, time is the co-author. I think its this process of time, of relationship, of exchange, of being a hybrid team. I think all this has to do with the trust that Davi and the Yanomami had with us.
Friendship. Because it's not just a film for us, it's a life relationship, it's a commitment, it's an alliance that is forever. It's not just a film. We are friends now, a friendship that exists, that is being built.
STEVE: You talk about time and it's an interesting thing. The film opens with seven or eight minutes of everybody just walking into the village. It's one of the best opening shots of a film I’ve ever seen. Honestly, I was a little hesitant the first time I saw the film. I felt it might be too long, but once I got into the film, and then upon seeing it again, I realized it's actually one of the most brilliant things you do because however long that first shot is, you go from I'm in a room in America, to I'm in the forest. And it's just like these people are coming to me and we're going to engage.
It's this thing where it's like “we're coming to you, we're going to engage with you” and then they do and you walk out of it and you feel wonderful. You've met all these friends that you never knew you had before.
It's this wonderful thing.
ERYK: Curiously, it was the first shot we shot of the film which is the Yanomamis arriving from the hunt. They went hunting a few days ago.
They're coming from the hunt to prepare the party for the community. So it was the first shot we shot a few hours after we landed in iWatoriki and I think it's a shot it's a synthesis shot of the film. It's a sequence shot of nine minutes.
It's as if the whole film is in this shot. And what he noticed is exactly what we feel, that they come walking slowly, they sprout from the ground they come walking with the forest together and the shot ends with Davi's look his face, his look looking at the camera. I think that's the theme of this film, this meeting, this clash between worlds, this confrontation between two worlds.
It starts with a more discernible shot, let's say, more abstract, the beginning, and it ends with Davi's look very strong at the camera, looking at us, chasing us. And I think this shot has a very theatrical a theatricality, a ritual. It's like a stage, the forest has this theatrical stage character.
And it's the time, it's the question of time, of respecting and understanding this time.
STEVE: I want to know how much, input Davi had in putting the film together. Also, I'm curious if the film is the film everything that he wanted. from the film as well?
DAVI: So, I wanted to show our magic, the magic of the community, the movement of the Reahu, the Reahu movement, of preparing, painting, taking food out of the pots, so, that's what I wanted. I wanted to do something historical, show to other relatives, non-relatives, the people of the city, to get to know them. So, we say that our movement is no longer like this, like this, curled up.
We're like this, surrounded by the city. The city is far away, but we're not surrounded.
We have Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia, so, what we want to do is show our different culture, our culture, our different language, to recognize, recognize, and protect our place, where it was filmed, and show to the people of the city that it was like this. In Watoriki, we're in our house.
Our house is the forest. Our house is the place. So, we're in Watoriki, in Brazil, and we're going to show our place where we live permanently.
I really wanted to show our image, the image of our community, the movement of Reahu since preparing the food, and then, you know, taking the food out of the earth.
I really wanted to show something historical, both for, they call in Brazil, relatives and non-relatives, it's like indigenous and non-indigenous people, and for the people of the city to know us, because our people are not isolated anymore, we are surrounded by cities, so we need to show our culture and our language in order to protect our own place. So, we are showing that to the people of the city, how he calls, and then we're showing our house, because we are Yanomami, we are Brazilians, and we're going to show where we are living, and he used the word permanently.
ERYK: And then it was at the premiere of the Cannes Film Festival for us, the birth of the film, and it was present, it was truly very exciting. And now the film has just played, last week, at the Hutukara party, the 20th anniversary of the Hutukara Yanomami Association, there was an exhibition, and we are drawing now, we are planning a project for next year, to launch the circuit in several communities in Yanomami, in Huatorique, and in other communities as well, so that people can watch the film.
STEVE: That's the one thing I don't have a sense of from the film, is how big is Davi’s land?
DAVI: This film only focuses on one community, out of 350 communities inside the Yanomami land. It's a huge territory.
STEVE:That's how you get people to pay attention, is you show them one, if you show one community, you're going to connect the people, instead of showing this huge community, because it makes it one-on-one, and that's what's wonderful about it.
ERYK: Yeah, that's it, it's a very... Although there are layers of information, of narrative, of information, which is important, but it's a film that bets much more on this experience of ours, on our relationship with this community, with Davi and the community, this immersion, this place where we've been for a while, and it reflects our experience we've had, this relationship of bringing, of how the energy of the party, the energy of the party of this people, of Yanomami, of this community, how this energy, this vitality, it roots the form and the language of the film.
I mean, we didn't arrive with a psychostatic, cinematographic project ready in our heads to execute, but we discovered the form, we had many intuitions, obviously, studies, intuitions, desires, inspirations, but we really discovered the form of the film from this daily relationship, this party, this intervibration with this community. From this, this energy was what inspired and rooted the form of the film..
STEVE:Just something that I wanted to say which isI think it's one of the reasons I love the film, is the film doesn't feel like a documentary. It feels like a narrative. And as a result, from my standpoint, for recommending it, I can tell people, see this movie, you're going somewhere, you're going to be told this great story about these great people.
Because I know some people don't like to watch a documentary. IThis is going to play like a drama. It plays out like you're watching Life in the Village, and it doesn't feel like I'm being told a documentary story. I'm being told a story. And I, which sounds kind of stupid, but the reality, but it's not.
It's sort of counterintuitive. It's being, people tend, a lot of people tend to connect to fiction, in some ways fictional characters, but with this, they're real people, but they feel like they're so well-rounded, I don't know how he did this, I don't know how he managed to get, everybody on screen feels like a fully formed character, which you don't get in documentaries. Somebody gets left out, and that's why it feels like a narrative.
It's that you're watching somebody who's, you're watching a movie where somebody wrote this out, and instead he's showing life, but it's being sketched out. Forgive me, I'm excited. I get excited about movies.
ERYK: Yeah, because the movie has a dramaturgy, it has a dramaturgical thought, and for the Yanomami there are no these catalogs between documentary and fiction that exist for us. The Yanomami the cosmology of the Yanomami, brings the dream as a fundamental question, from shamanism, from Yakuana, so this brings another perspective, right, which is not, so that's why the movie doesn't work with these categories, so, let's say, you can recognize this or that. As I said, we are very inspired by Davi's thoughts, by the fall of the sky.
THE FALLING SKY opens in LA on April 2 before opening in the rest of the country.
